Why are you here?

[Guy_Montag]

I'm just curious why there are so many Brits on here.

I'm not sure when I first found this place I think it may have been during the Gulf War & I found the LBN was a fairly accurate news source. At least the dodgy headlines were shot down pretty quickly.

Since then I've mostly hung about in the lounge, though I occasionally venture in GD I find it can be a little aggressive.

So tell me about yourselves.

[sweetheart]

1. speaking out

I came to DU after they closed the ukonline.gov.uk "your say" free
speech forum in july 2002.

I had only spoken a small bit until the 9/11, when i realized that
"sane" voices were not speaking out, as the vast majority were
calling for war, and have gotten us in to the mess we're in today.

Had gore won in 2000, i might never have taken to this at all.

GD is aggressive, and people use ad hominem attacks regularly to
avoid making a point, as is common on american television where the
cuture takes its benchmark.

I'm not a brit, but we are resident here in the UK and may become
citizens in the future, so it is worth it to speak up as equals
over injustice.

It strikes me that the UK has overly strong influence over US policy
given the "specious relationship", and that when blair shut down
the free speech forums to prepare for lying in to a war, it left
a vacuum on the left side of the atlantic for such boards.

It still does not quite seem british, as we're missing the millions
of threads on animal rights, fox hunting and lelandii hedges.. :-)

[non sociopath skin]

2. I'm a Brit married to an American ...

... who has always been interested in things American, movies, music, history and literature as well as politics.

However, curiously enough, I'm here because of a right-wing website, Sterling Times (I pop in sometimes to see how many cases of apoplexy I can cause in an on-line session). Their webmaster regularly condemns DU along with other vile Marxist conspiracies as the New York Times, the Guardian, the BBC and the UK traffic laws as the Very Spawn of Satan.

I thought that, in company like that, DU must have something. So I visited. And stayed. :)

The Skin

[baby_mouse]

14. Same as me

How nice! :-)

I registered today after a proctracted period of lurking on the protestwarrior.com fora, which is a bit like watching a nest of scorpions eat itself. They despise DU with a exquisite passion, so, after torturing myself purposelessly for almost a month by reacting emotionally without replying to a bunch of mind-torturing ass-weasels I have decided to spend some time talking to pleasant, reasonable people.

And so I am here.

Hello.

:hi:

[sweetheart]

15. cool... welcome!

Good to have a scot on board.! :-)

[T_i_B]

17. Looks like they've been watching you N_S_S!

http://www.websitetoolbox.com/tool/post/sterlingtimes/vpost?id=212501&highlight=democratic+underground

[non sociopath skin]

18. Fame at last!

The Skin

[T_i_B]

3. I've been here for a while

Since April/May 2001. The reason I'm here is quite simply concern about George W Bush and the effects of his policies on the world.

People here didn't seem to mind me so I stayed. I tend to find that non-US DUers have a lot to give on here just as Americans can be a good influence on UK boards!

[Guy_Montag]

4. Can you recommend

some good UK boards, I'm bored of US boards.

Except DU of course :)

[T_i_B]

5. I used to frequent a UK board

called Liberty Watch UK. It was small but it had a good mix of intelligent posters from both left and right. Sadly that board has not been posted on in months. I'd post the link but the last time I did that a DUer got a virus from that site. :-(

Currently I'm starting to dip my toe into Christian discussion forums. However, I don't have the ability as yet to write huge essays on free will and predestination as some people can.

[LeftishBrit]

6. I have American relatives, and am quite interested in American politics

Especially now that Bush has got Blair in his pocket. I basically just lurked until this forum was created.

[billyskank]

8. The Grauniad's talkboards used to be quite good

a few too many transatlantic flamewars though. For some reason a few too many of the US posters there seem to be freepers. Haven't been there in ages though.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/talk

[non sociopath skin]

9. It never fails to amaze me how obsessed Freepers are with the Grauniad....

... whose editorial line isn't exactly confrontational with the Republicans. Then again, they seem to regard anything to the left of Genghis Khan as a Trotskyist front.

Just read a posting on a Freeperlike site which said that initially they were worried that Bush wasn't conservative enough. Oy vey!!

The Skin

[billyskank]

7. I lurked since 2000 and became a member early 2002

I started lurking after following a link from http://www.bushwatch.com. I was reading Bush Watch in turn since I saw a link to it in the Grauniad. Strange thing is I now almost know more about American politics than I do British politics.

[non sociopath skin]

10. Good site, Bill. Just bookmarked it.

Actually, in spite of Bush, I find American politics more hopeful than the British variety at the moment.

The Skin

[Tashi]

11. It's a bit sad

because there's no Australian thread, as a colonial I have to post in the UK thread.

That said, I don't yearn for a purely Australian thread, that said, I was born in London.

We are coming up to an election, no fixed term so we are the mercy of our PM. He is a ardent Bush follower, there are some really rude Aussie words to describe that, he can't make up his mind to go before or after Bush. My interest in this forum is the desire to see Bush OUT followed by John Howard.

I would like to find a truly international forum.

[Pert_UK]

12. I got into this place 'cause I went to school with EarlG....

He told me that he'd started it up after he moved to the US, so I checked it out and then stayed.

I find that LBN is usually a good source of what's going on and the Lounge is often very amusing and a nice place to get film recommendations or warnings about how completely pants something is. Also, as a Philosophy grad I can't resist wading into the Gungeon (J/PS) and pointing out when people are being completely moronic and illogical.

I've stopped going in there so much recently - there's only so much logical debate you can have with someone who believes that guns should be available to everyone as an inherent human right and with no restrictions.....

[fedsron2us]

13. Simple. Most UK politicians merely ape their US counterparts

so American politics has a huge influence on our domestic agenda. Why worry about the monkey when it is the organ grinder who plays the tune

[Maiden England]

16. I'm a Brit exiled to the US.

Dragged kicking and screaming by my Yank hubby. Well, perhaps there's a tad of a exaggeration there. Still, I'm here because I'm fixing to get the vote, if there still is one in time to re-elect Kerry in 2008. I shall miss this US election by a mere couple of months (insert Crashcart style snarl here). Still, I'm looking at a form right now, which gives me the right to a proxy vote in the UK, apparently I get to keep that right for the next 16 years or so, so I'm actually looking for info on both sides of the atlantic.
Still not sure on who to vote for in next years General, blimey, I really am an undecided voter. Cripes, I feel special now...

[Michael_UK]

19. www.freeconservatives.com

I came here (in a similar fashion to the person who read Sterling Times) after reading this fantasticly funny website. Not only is it incredibly right wing, but its regulars are so stupid. They pointed out DU and I came along and love it.

It wasn't until 9/11 that I got interested in US politics and living with some American students (I'm a Brit). I didn't really care in 2000 about Gore V Bush, but in 2004, I was hooked.

DU is fantastic - some of it is pretty hectic but you can find that there are sane people out there - it gives me faith in the American people (who often are the target of jokes)

[Anarcho-Socialist]

20. I've always been interested in politics...

...but since I married an American, my interest in U.S. politics increased dramatically.

I was looking for a left-wing message board to frequent and found DU from a link via a progressive blog in March 2004. After a couple of weeks of lurking, I joined.

Two months later I was accused of being a freeper because I was "too left-wing" in my first flame war. That's GD for you. :)

[mr blur]

21. I found it a couple of years ago,

and I can't remember how. I was amazed at the things that were going on in the US and stuck around to get the American POV on them. Now I'm even more amazed at things happening in the US. I seem to constantly say the "wrong" things when posting, though not deliberately. It's constant culture shock, really - you follow peoples' posts and get a "picture" of them and then suddenly they're all talking about how many guns they own and arguing about much stopping power they have. And just about everybody here seems to watch television, which seems bizarre to me.
It's a free discussion place and I like that but then all of a sudden there'll seem to be a 'party line' on some issue - religion for example - which, inevitably, I don't seem to follow. I keep thinking about leaving, but I keep getting drawn back in.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

23. I've thought about leaving a few times...

...but I keep on staying. I don't think there's a progressive blog/message board as good as this one.

[D-Notice]

22. From an email list I was on in 2000:

The Misanthropic Bitch - there was a link to this site.

I lurked about for about 3yr - didn't start posting until sometime last yr as I didn't have anything interesting to say... I still don't but it doesn't stop me! ;-)

[Taxloss]

24. Because I love 'Murca.

I love its people, even the crap ones - freepers and dittoheads are far more interesting that the Mail-reading drones who make up the bulk of Tory support. And the better sort of American, the progressives - they're always among the best and the brightest in a room. I love America's energy, its sense of purpose, its sense that it should agree on some things. Britain seemed to lose its sense that the country should agree on things in the 1970s.

I love America's city skylines, all that aspiration in glass and steel. I love its literature. I love the retro look of its newspapers. I love the fact that they haven't cottoned on to the fact that we're more modern than them. I love their scenery and their openness.

And I love about 78 other things about them. Probably more.

And DU is a wonderful congregation of the best kind of American.